Three more including kingpin Patwari arrested in Land fraud case

A day after arresting an imposter Sanjeev Kumar, who claimed compensation of Rs 1.09 crore on the basis of forged ownership documents of a farmer's land, the city police arrested the alleged kingpin, a former patwari with the Jalandhar Improvement Trust (JIT) Sukhdev Singh and his two accomplices.

A raid was conducted at the residence of Sukhdev Singh at Bilga, additional deputy commissioner of police (ADCP) Naresh Dogra told HT, adding that his brother-in-law Kulwant Singh and one Ravi Kumar, in whose account Rs 10 lakh each was transferred from Sanjeev's account had also been nabbed.

The ADCP did not rule out the involvement of other employees of JIT in the fraud.

On the complaint of a farmer Devinder Kumar, owner of about five kanals of land in Bashirpura, that an unknown individual received compensation of Rs 1.09 crore on his behalf, the city police arrested Sanjeev Kumar, a resident of Sanjay Gandhi Nagar on Wednesday.

The fraud came to light on Tuesday when a JIT team visited the site to take possession of the land, where the trust has planned a residential colony.

However, the farmer objected to the JIT's action, showing the officials a stay order on the procurement of his land.

On his insistence, JIT officials checked their record and discovered that Rs 1.09 crore had been released as compensation for the said land. SDM Iqbal Singh Sandhu then started an inquiry and traced the bank account in which the compensation money had been deposited to the Reru village branch of Punjab & Sind Bank, leading to the arrest of the imposter Sanjeev Kumar.